Nightmare
by Walking on Starlit Dreams
Summary: Dapplepaw is an amazing hunter, but she is plagued with terrible dreams. Her denmate Rosepaw is always jealous of her skill. Will Dapplepaw get over her dreams? Or will Rosepaw win this battle? One-Shot.


_Everybody has dreams. Normally they are filled with joy and happiness, or just a peaceful feeling. But some have the worst kind of dreams: nightmares._

Dapplepaw pushed through the thorn barrier, holding a fat sparrow in her jaws. She held her head high with pride as she heard the praise.

"Brilliant catch, Dapplepaw!"

"She's a true hunting prodigy!"

"How does she do that?"

Dapplepaw's eyes narrowed when she heard a certain annoying voice.

"How come she gets all the attention?! _I_ caught two squirrels yesterday!"

Dapplepaw sighed. Her denmate, Rosepaw, was being her usual annoying self. Her father, Thornwhisper, padded up to her.

"I know, sweetie, but that took you from dawn to nearly sunhigh. Dapplepaw caught the sparrow in only a few moments," he mewed to his angry daughter.

Rosepaw huffed. "She was just lucky."

_Someone woke up on the wrong side of the nest_! Dapplepaw thought. Looking up at the sky, she saw it was already dusk. _No. No. Not yet. Please not yet._

"I'll go hunt some more!" she offered.

"That's okay, Dapplepaw," Stormwind called. "It's getting late. You should get some sleep."

_No_! Dapplepaw forced herself to walk to her nest and lie down.

"Sweet dreams," her sister, Swanpaw, mumbled sleepily.

_As if._ Dapplepaw shivered as she thought of dreams. She didn't want to have dreams. They scared her half to death every night. But she was just so tired...

She closed her eyes and was out like a light. She woke in a patch of yellowing grass that poked her paws when she touched them. Footsteps were getting very close.

Rosepaw appeared a few tail-lengths away. "Let's have a hunting contest," she said, grinning evilly.

_Not this dream again!_ Dapplepaw forced herself to smile. "Sorry, Rosepaw, but I don't really want to."

Rosepaw's eyes darkened. "Well, that's too bad."

A wall of flames suddenly surrounded Dapplepaw. It set the grass on fire as well. Dapplepaw coughed, unable to breathe.

"Okay, I'll do it," she finally choked out.

The flames disappeared and Rosepaw fake-smiled. "First to catch something wins."

Dapplepaw raced off, following the scent of a sparrow. She stopped in a clearing and watched the bird just sitting on a branch. She crept closer and lunged. She was closer, closer, and-

Rosepaw slammed into her and bit the sparrow's neck, killing it. Dapplepaw staggered and turned to face Rosepaw.

"I win." Rosepaw grinned happily. "You know, I'm hungry. I'll need another piece of prey." She lunged at Dapplepaw's throat and everything went black.

"No!" Dapplepaw screamed, waking up. Dawn was just arriving. Swanpaw was up in a flash. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing... Just a dream," Dapplepaw replied shakily.

"Again, Dapplepaw?" Rosepaw meowed angrily. "I need my beauty sleep."

Dapplepaw rolled her eyes and padded out. She saw the deputy, Flamepelt.

"Want me to join the hunting patrol?" she asked.

"Sure," Flamepelt agreed. "They just left."

Dapplepaw raced out of camp and sniffed the air. _I don't smell any cats... maybe I should hunt solo for a while_, she thought.

Almost immediately, she smelled squirrel. Racing after the scent, she found herself at the base of a tall tree. The squirrel was near the top with her babies.

Silent as a mouse, Dapplepaw hopped onto a branch and began scaling the tree. She was a few branches away. She could just taste the squirrel. The fatty meat, the crunch of bones, the-

"You're never going to catch that!"

The squirrel looked up, saw Dapplepaw, and quickly carried her babies to a nearby tree. Dapplepaw looked at the ground. "Why did you do that, Rosepaw?!" she hissed.

"I'm not letting you steal my thunder," Rosepaw growled. "You're always being a show-off."

Dapplepaw leaped to the ground and hissed again. "I'm not being a show-off! You're being stuck up!"

Rosepaw suddenly grew calm. "You know, Dapplepaw, you haven't even had one bit of battle training since you became an apprentice a half-moon ago."

"Yeah," Dapplepaw mewed, oblivious. "So?"

"So I would easily win in a fight," Rosepaw mewed smugly. "Not to mention my-how do I put this-_extra_ training from Thistleclaw."

Dapplepaw gasped. "You- You train in the Dark Forest?"

"Duh. How did you not notice?" Rosepaw meowed. "Back to business. Goodbye, Dapplepaw."

Rosepaw's lunged for her throat once more. Everything went black, just like in her dreams.

But this time she didn't wake up.

**You like? I love dreams. You can make them as crazy and awesome as you want. Feel free to drop a review!**

**-Petaleh**


End file.
